Blinkbox Music (originally We7) was a free, advertising supported, music streaming service, with over 12 million tracks available for streaming in the UK and Ireland, with content from the music industry, and most independent labels and distributors.
It was founded by former Genesis frontman Peter Gabriel and tech entrepreneur Steve Purdham, who had previously co-founded and built his previous company SurfControl PLC. Senior management included Gareth Reakes, Russell Chadwick and music executive Clive Gardiner.
Songs streamed on Blinkbox Music were accompanied by a short audio advert, or blipvert, which plays before each song. This was usually combined with a change in the advert on the page, with the intent of the audio advert drawing attention to the clickable advert.
We7 reached 500,000 users and 3.5 million tracks in March 2009[1] and 3 million users and 6.8 million tracks in January 2011.[2]
In June 2012, We7 was acquired by UK retailer Tesco for £10.8 million[3] and was rebranded under the Blinkbox